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Daughters of Zelophehad

Then drew near the daughters of Zelophehad …. of the families of Manasseh, the son of Joseph; and these are the names of his daughters: Mahlah, Noah, and Hoglah, and Milcah, and Tirzah. And they stood before Moses and before Eleazar, the priest, and before the princes and all the congregation at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, saying: “Our father died in the desert, …. and he had no sons. Why should our father's name be done away from among his family, because he had no son? Give unto us a possession among the brethren of our father.” (Numbers 27:1-4) In the Torah portion that was read last Shabbat in the Diaspora, Phineas (Pinchas), we read the story of the five daughters of Zelophehad who brought the claim for inheritance in [...]

Ẓiẓit, Koraḥ, and Wave-Particle Duality

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the children of Israel and you shall say to them that they shall make for themselves fringes [ẓiẓit] on the corners of their garments, throughout their generations, and they shall affix a thread of sky blue [wool] on the fringe of each corner. (Num. 15:37,38) They [Koraḥ and his men] assembled against Moses and Aaron, and said to them, “You take too much upon yourselves, for the entire congregation are all holy, and the Lord is in their midst. So why do you raise yourselves above the Lord's assembly” (Num. 16:3) The Torah portion Shelach deals primarily with the fiasco of the spies sent by Moses to scout out the land of Canaan. The portion ends, however, seemingly out of turn, with the commandment to [...]

Fitting Pieces of the Puzzle Together

Meditations on the Maaseh Merkavah – IV This is the fourth and the final installment in the series of posts related to Ezekiel’s prophesy, Ma’aseh Merkava, “The Making of the Chariot.” For background information, refer to the previous posts, “Space – Between Future and Past,” “Relational Space,” and “Collapse of the Wave Function.” Regular readers of my blog may be wondering about my last post “Futurist Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics,” which was about my new interpretation of quantum mechanics. This is not a physics blog, however; the Quantum Torah blog is about Torah and physics (or, more broadly, Torah and science). What did the last post have to do with Torah? Hopefully, it will all now become clear. Last Shavuot I had a very unusual experience. Sitting in shul listening to the reading [...]

Futurist Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics

(A popular summary of the paper “Towards Futuristic Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics” by Alexander Poltorak being currently prepared for publication) Quantum mechanics (QM) is one of the most successful theories of physics that withstood the test of time. Indeed, it is one of the best-tested theories known to science. Yet, we hardly advanced in our understanding of the meaning of QM since its inception almost a century ago. The indeterministic nature of the theory puts it at odds with both classical physics and our intuition, and continues to perplex physicists and philosophers of science today as it perplexed Einstein, who famously said, “G‑d does not play dice with the universe!” Superposition and entanglement seem to defy common sense and, yet, they have been confirmed experimentally time and again. The phenomenon known as the [...]

Collapse of the Wave Function

Meditations on the Maaseh Merkavah – III This is the third installment in the series of posts related to the Ezekiel’s prophesy, Maaseh Merkava, “The Making of the Chariot.” For background information, the reader is referred to my previous posts, “Space – Between Future and Past” and “ Relational Space.” As I wrote in the first post, “Space – Between Future and Past,” Sefirot line up against four letters of Tetragrammaton, Y‑H‑W‑H, as follows: Yud י Chokhmah, Abba Heh  ה Binah, Imma Waw  ו Six Lower Sephirot (Z”A) Heh  ה Malchut   The first two letters of the proper name of G‑d, Y‑H‑W‑H – Havayah, or Tetragrammaton – are י “Yud” (sometimes transliterated as "Yod") and ה “Heh” (sometimes transliterated as "Hey" or "He").  During the reading of the Ezekiel’s prophesy Maaseh Merkava [...]

The Entangled Tenth

And all the tithe of the herd or the flock, whatsoever passeth under the rod, the tenth shall be holy unto the Lord.” (Leviticus 27:32) This Shabbat, I was called up to the Torah for the last aliyah (lit. “ascent”, meaning the reading from the Scroll) of the book of Leviticus. This portion talks about tithing animals, giving the precise procedure for doing so – every animal is released from a pen one by one while being counted – one, two, three, … , ten. The tenth animal is touch by the rode and consecrated as the ma’aser – tithe. The Torah states that every tenth animal is holy unto G‑d. What is the state of the animals before counting? They have two possible states: (1) chulin, i.e., “not sacred” and (2) ma’aser, [...]

Unified Field Theory and the Dew of Resurrection

And ye shall take you on the first day the fruit of goodly trees, branches of palm-trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook (Levit. 23:40) After completing his masterpiece, the General Theory of Relativity in 1916, Albert Einstein spent the rest of his life working fruitlessly on unifying gravity with electromagnetism. His quest was to develop a unified field theory that would unify his General Relativity, a theory of gravitational, with Maxwell electrodynamics. To his great dismay, Einstein never succeeded in developing a unified field theory. It was actually even worse. While working tirelessly on unifying two known classical fields – gravitational field and electromagnetic field – Einstein missed the incredible progress in quantum physics, of which he was one of the founders and for which he received his [...]

Adultery and Monogamy of Entanglement

And whosoever lieth carnally with a woman, that is a bondmaid, designated for a man, and not at all redeemed, nor was freedom given her; there shall be inquisition; they shall not be put to death, because she was not free. (Lev. 19:20) In Quantum physics there is a principle of monogamy of entanglement, which roughly means that if two particles (or objects) are entangled, neither can be entangled with a third particle (or object). A human parallel to this principle is obvious – if two spouses are married, neither can have any intimate relations with a third person. In other words, a marriage must be monogamous. It is because of this parallel that the physical relationship between entangled particles in quantum mechanics was named the monogamy principle, or monogamy of entanglement. In [...]

Ye shall be disentangled… but not disengaged

In my post, “Ye Shall be Disentangled,” I suggested that the verse: “Ye shall be holy, for I, the Lord, your G‑d, am holy” (Levit. 19:2) may be interpreted as: “Ye shall be disentangled, for I, the Lord, your G‑d, am disentangled.” I supported this proposition with the quantum monogamy principle (a.k.a. monogamy of entanglement) according to which, if two objects are entangled, neither of them can also be entangled with a third object. Consequently, if we wish to be entangled with G‑d, we cannot also be entangled with the material world, as it would violate the monogamy principle. Thus, we must disentangle from the world, i.e., be holly. One may legitimately object to this interpretation because, in Judaism, we do not have monasteries; we do not have monks, we don't withdraw from [...]

Quantum Torah Film Premiere

Welcome to the premiere of our first film, Quantum Torah. You can watch the film here: https://youtu.be/uTrMj80k6QE   Don't forget to subscribe to my channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNVwLUClNUXVBqJUI9A47AQ/

Quantum Torah — Film Premiere

I am excited to announce that the premiere of our film "Quantum Torah" is scheduled for this Friday, March 1st. You can see the trailer at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXIq3entXOY&t=1s Not to miss the premiere, subscribe to my channel, Quantum Torah on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNVwLUClNUXVBqJUI9A47AQ I look forward to your comments. See you on YouTube!  

Vectors, Spins, and Gender

Vectors, Spins, and Gender Speak to the children of Israel, and have them take for Me an offering; from every person whose heart inspires him to generosity, you shall take My offering. (Ex. 25:2) Every physics professor teaching physics 101 to freshmen spends the first lecture teaching vector algebra. Why vectors are so important? Because most quantities in mechanics (a branch of physics dealing with motion and forces) are vectors. A vector is a mathematical object that has a magnitude and a direction. For example, velocity is a vector – it shows not only how fast the object is moving, but also in what direction it is moving (it is different from “speed” which is an average velocity and is just a number). Similarly, acceleration is a vector, force is a vector, angular [...]

Wellsprings from Above and Wellsprings from Below

In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month… all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. (Gen. 7:11) In calculating the time of the dawn of Messianic revelation, the Zohar writes, And after six hundred years of the sixth thousand there will be opened the gates of wisdom above and the fountains of wisdom below, and the world will make preparations to enter on the seventh thousand as man makes preparation on the sixth day of the week, when the sun is about to set. (Zohar I, 117a) The Zohar calculates this based on the letters of the Tetragrammaton, but brings the verse from this parashah as the mnemonic: “In the six hundredth [...]

Day Six – the State of Superposition

And G‑d saw all that He had made, and behold it was very good, and it was evening and it was morning, the sixth day. (Gen. 1:31)   The Biblical narrative of creation concludes with the above verse. Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (a.k.a. Rashi) comments on this verse: the sixth day: Scripture added a “hey” on the sixth [day], at the completion of the Creation, to tell us that He stipulated with them, [“you were created] on the condition that Israel accept the Five Books of the Torah.” [The numerical value of the “hey” is five.] (Tanchuma Bereishith 1). Another explanation for “the sixth day”: They [the works of creation] were all suspended until the “sixth day,” referring to the sixth day of Sivan, which was prepared for the giving of the Torah (Shab. 88a). [...]

Sabbatical Year – when the Wavefunctions are Collapsed

The Torah portion, Re’eh, talks about the Sabbatical Year—in Hebrew, Shemitah—the Seventh year. When the Sabbatical year comes, all loans are forgiven, and Jewish servants go free. This is difficult to understand. Why would a lender forgive a loan just because it’s the seventh year in the Shemitah cycle? Why would slaves be set free just because it’s the Sabbatical year? Another question is why do we translate Shemitah as the “Sabbatical year”? Besides the fact that it is the seventh year, and Shabbat is the seventh day, what connects the word “shemitah” with Shabbat? As Rabbi Yehoshua Steinberg writes in Biblical Hebrew Etymology, (see Re’eh: The Slippery Year? – The Wonders of the Holy Tongue), the three-letter root of the word “shemitah” – Shin-Mem-Tet – connote falling, collapsing, slipping, weakening, or disintegration. The two-letter [...]

Re’eh – the Power of Seeing the Blessings

The Torah portion Re’eh, begins with the verse: Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse. (Deut. 11:26) The first word of this verse, re’eh, literally means “see” in Hebrew. So, literally, this verse should be translated as: See, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse Spoken words are heard, not seen. Why did Moses implore people to see, as he was about to set before them a blessing and a curse? To understand this, we need to look at the following verses defining the blessing and the cure: The blessing, if ye shall hearken unto the commandments of the Lord your G‑d… (Deut. 11:27) …and the curse, if ye shall not hearken unto the commandments of the Lord your G‑d… (Deut. 11:28) Does this [...]

Purim—the Day when We Celebrate Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking

This is what Haman did not understand. Even at the highest level, where there is a complete symmetry between Jacob and Esau, G‑d chooses Jacob—a spiritual example of the spontaneous symmetry breaking: "I loved you, said the Lord, and you said, “How have You loved us?” Was not Esau a brother to Jacob? says the Lord. And I loved Jacob. And I hated Esau…" (Malachi I, 2-3). Haman failed the test on quantum field theory and ended up hanging on a gallows.

Grand Unification

In physics, we seek Grand Unification, also known as the Theory of Everything. The Standard Model describes three out of the four fundamental forces: the strong (nuclear) force, the weak force (beta decay), and the electromagnetic force. The gravitational force, described by the General Theory of Relativity, does not fit into the Standard Model. Developing a quantum theory of gravity, and unifying gravity with the other three forces is the holy grail of theoretical physics. Jewish people are also in need of Grand Unification. There is a schism that runs through the history: it is the schism between Joseph (Yosef) and Judah (Yehuda). Judah represents a “shtetl yid,” a Jew who lives in a ghetto, who sits in a yeshivah, who learns Torah, and who sees the world outside as hostile, as a [...]

Dreams of Pharaoh—A Lesson in Symmetry

In the Torah portion Miketz, Pharaoh has two dreams. He wakes up agitated and calls on all the wise men of Egypt to interpret his dreams. Nobody is able to come up with an acceptable interpretation, so they fetch Joseph from prison and he successfully interprets the dreams of Pharaoh—that there will be seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine. Joseph proceeds to instruct Pharaoh on how to prepare for the seven years of famine. In the previous posts, "Interpreting Dreams" and "Joseph—the Master of Time," we already explained how Joseph was able to interpret dreams in terms of units of time and why Pharaoh appointed Joseph as the viceroy of Egypt. This story, however, still has mysteries to unlock. Perhaps it can teach us more lessons. In Talmudic and [...]

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